


Run (Like Hell)

by rowanthestrange_yugihell



Series: Doctor Clara-Verse [3]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Angst, F/F, Foregone Conclusions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-10
Updated: 2015-12-10
Packaged: 2018-05-06 00:16:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5395487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowanthestrange_yugihell/pseuds/rowanthestrange_yugihell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of the things she didn’t expect, was how much the running would become part of her.</p>
<p><em>He</em> knew of course: “Run like hell, because you always need to.” Knew exactly what she’d do and gave her permission to do it, gave her the ‘Doctor rules’. She writes them all down with a whiteboard pen on the wall of an empty room in her TARDIS. Even the one about the pears.</p>
<p>She doesn’t want to die yet, she has a time machine, she can’t age. It’ll happen, there will be a moment darker than the rest and she’ll get there. But for now, she doesn’t want to go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Run (Like Hell)

**Author's Note:**

> Angsty and a bit sad. Lighter and softer next time, I promise. But one of the first rules of time travel - just because you know how it's going to end, doesn't mean it isn't worth the journey it takes to get there.

 

One of the things she didn’t expect, was how much the running would become part of her.

_He_  knew of course:  _“Run like hell, because you always need to.”_  Knew exactly what she’d do and gave her permission to do it, gave her the ‘Doctor rules’. She writes them all down with a whiteboard pen on the wall of an empty room in her TARDIS. Even the one about the pears.

She doesn’t want to die yet, she has a time machine, she can’t age. It’ll happen, there will be a moment darker than the rest and she’ll get there. But for now, she doesn’t want to go.

*

She dumps the Doctor in America with a stranger and leaves him to get the TARDIS. It might actually be worse than Aberdeen. She doesn’t know how much he’s going to remember, but knows he was in America with Amy and Rory at some point before the incident with one of her echoes. She really should’ve got the TARDIS first, but she didn’t and leaving him just seems like the best idea. What happens if he wakes up? She’s not sure she’s thinking straight, but the urge to  _run_  and  _leave_  is too strong, and so she does.

*

Her TARDIS is a diner and a show-off. In the empty room, she changes into one of the dresses in the pile of clothes she stole from old Blue - it looks oddly fitting for the situation, and she wonders if the girl could see what was going to happen and snuck it in. Time machines. The shoes aren’t hers either, but look familiar. If she’s playing one last trick on her, she doesn’t know what it is.

She lies her clothes on the spotless floor. Takes a picture of her hair. There’s a hum and on one of the walls there is now a frame, with a copy of her sock held vertically mid way by some sort of force field. Something Time Lord probably, but she gets the idea, and places the clothes in as neatly as possible. It’s like looking in a mirror, but without her body there - a ghost her. Memento mori.

She suddenly can’t stand it and strides out, past Me pressing buttons, and into the “diner”. She picks up a magazine to escape into, “Lorem Ipsum! Dolor sit amet-” and lets out a humourless laugh as a sense of resignation washes over her. He’ll be here in a minute. Can’t run from it. This is the moment, the end, and all she can do is hope she’s prepared for it.

*

She’s back in her ship and faking her new version of normality. Me and the TARDIS cause a spark of genuine happiness, and the universe seems vast before her. She shouldn’t be able to be happy yet, should be crying and curling up and processing. But no, it’s something else that can be run from, so she does.

*

She can run forever.

Her legs never tire, her breathing unnecessary, she doesn’t dehydrate, she doesn’t get hungry.

It saves her ‘life’, such that it is, more than once.

She runs from things that hurt, from people who love her, from responsibility. She was never good at those things before, but she knows it’s getting worse. People in danger, children crying, exploration screw up - “It’s okay, I can fix it.” And she does, she’s an excellent Doctor. Until it’s too big and complicated. Fundamentally broken systems, power vacuums and inevitable apocalyptic tragedies. The long term treatment. Then she runs for the hills. 

But that saves her ‘life’, such that it is, too.

*

Me doesn’t like running away.  

Isn’t that what it all began with, her and the Mire and a refusal to just leave? What she liked, even as it damned them? Me has spent most of her life putting together the pieces left behind from people like her, who ran instead of facing the effects of their actions. She loves that about her, she needs that balance, even as she hates it.

They argue, fight, say terrible things to each other. She is never less a Doctor than when this happens - cruel, check, cowardly, oh yes. And it’s not even a real argument, because she knows Me is right, even when neither of them really want her to be. So they just shout hurtful things until neither of them can find anything else to say, and their anger cools. They make it up to each other, as best as they can. For Me, when she’s calm, it’s water off a duck’s back. Me knows why this happens, and knows that she’s right, about everything, too long lived to hold grudges. As for her, she tries to rationalise, remember that she needs this, and find things to do that can help her ignore the word “heartless” that sits on her brain like a demon.

One day, she knows, she’s going to want to leave. And Me will want to stay behind.

And on that day she’ll do what she always does. She’ll get in her TARDIS, and she’ll run.


End file.
